When I got back to my apartment all I did was sleep for nearly three days, because I was unable to do anything else.

April’s eyes widened in surprise when I opened the front door, headache throbbing and eyes swollen from too much sleeping and crying.

“Why are you here so early?” I asked.

“Because no matter when I call I get your answering machine,” she said shutting the door and following me into the living room. With a sigh, I continued on to retrieve the leftover pizza from the previous night, and put it into the microwave.

“Are you ready to talk yet?” she asked me and I shook my head. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

“That hurts.”

I turned to her. “Oh babe, it’s not because I don’t want to share it with you, you know that. I just want to forget about it all for now. Once it’s all sorted out in my brain and I get back to normal I’ll tell you everything.”

“I’m here for you, okay,” she said and came over to force me into a hug. Her big stomach kept the hug oddly A shaped. I tried and failed to get away so I just relaxed into her arms, the familiar embrace reminding me of the one I had received from my mother yesterday.

“Are you sure there is nothing I can do?” she pushed.

“Yup.”

“Can I just ask one tiny, little question?”

I glared at her. “One. Just one. Don’t ask any more questions after it.”

She pulled away and lifted her hand. “I swear, I won’t.”

“What is it?”

“Did you fall in love with him?”

I ran my hands through my untidy hair. “Yes. I fell in love with him, but we’re from two different worlds. Don’t worry, I don’t regret it or anything, I just truly hope that he’ll be alright.”

She was quiet as I turned back to the microwave and just as I had expected she couldn’t hold back.

“But he didn’t break up with you … his wife was the one who—”

“Please, April. You’re not making it any better. Just leave it, okay. It was a very complicated situation and maybe this is for the best, for everyone concerned.”

She bit her tongue while I plated my pizza.

“I just have one more question,” she said finally.

I frowned at her. Now she was just taking the piss.

“I’m so sorry but this is really the last one. Speaking from experience, powerful men don’t let go of what they want. If he finds you and wants you back, what will you do?”

My heart jumped into my throat. I opened my mouth, but no words would come out.

I stood there gaping like a demented goldfish until she came to me and put her arms around me. “I’m sorry, Charlotte. I should have kept my big mouth shut.”

“It’s okay. It’s okay. I’ll be fine. Time will sort me out.” I flashed her a fake smile. We went into the living room and I chewed uninterestedly at my pizza while I listened to her talk about Yuri and her baby. I was glad she had come. It took my mind off Brett. I had pushed the plate away when the doorbell rang.

I groaned. “It’s that damn new postman again. Why can’t he just leave it behind the flowerpot like the other one used to do?”

“I’ll go,” she called as she headed off to answer the door.

I picked up my empty plate to go to the kitchen, when April called out to me. Something in her voice made me stop in my tracks. Slowly, I moved towards the hallway. One step at a time. It was not the new postman.

Standing at my apartment door was the man I had not been able to keep out of my mind for more than three seconds for the last three days.

She couldn’t stop looking at him as she spoke, while his gaze had already moved past her to me.

“You have a guest,” she said.

I gripped the plate hard. I couldn’t breathe.

“Charlotte?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” I squeaked out.

“Okay, I’ll leave now,” she said, giving me a wink. “I don’t think I can stand here and watch you turn into a creepy awestruck stranger.”

She went through the door and he came in. I tried to settle my erratically beating heart, but it was beating so hard I wouldn’t have been surprised if he could hear it. I took a deep breath as my eyes hungrily roved over him. He was dressed immaculately in a double-breasted navy blue suit. His presence seemed to dwarf my entire apartment. My hands itched, the need to touch him an almost possessing force.

“Brett,” I said.

“You left,” he accused.

“I wasn’t exactly given a choice. How did you find me?”

He shrugged. “I found the name of the agency from a letterhead Jillian had left in the drawing room, but the agency wouldn’t give me your address so I bought it.”

I shook my head at the lives of rich people. “Just like that, huh?”

“What did you expect me to do? Just leave it?”

“No, but…”

“You made no attempt to contact me,” he said. Something dark slipped into his eyes then and it made me sad. I truly, truly more than anything else … more than even my desire to be with him, wanted him to be happy. Thoroughly and boundlessly.

“You were not really mine and I was put in my place.”

He took a step towards me. “You’re mine,” he said harshly. “If you didn’t want to be then you shouldn’t have worked your way into my heart in the first place. But as you did, I’m not letting you go.”

Hot tears filled my eyes. My heart felt like it was ready to burst. “I don't know that she will let us be. She will always be in the way poisoning you and Zackary.”

“I apologize that you had to deal with Jillian. It must have been so humiliating for you, but Jillian will never trouble us again.”

“How can you say that? She is Zackary’s mother. She will always be in the picture.”

“After I found out you’d gone, I told her to move out. She got very drunk and stormed out of the castle and ordered Barnaby to bring her car to her. Unfortunately for her, she met with a really bad accident. She got thrown out of her car just like I had. But unlike me she damaged her spinal cord.”

“What?” I gasped, my hand coming over my mouth.

“Yeah, it’s hard to even imagine it, but Jillian is paralyzed from the neck down.”

“Oh, my God!”

“It was her own fault. She liked riding the danger train in more ways than one and it was only a matter of time before something bad happened to her.”

“Where is she now?”

“In one of the best hospitals money can buy.”

“That’s horrible. I detested her, but I didn’t want that for her.”

“When I went to see her she thought I had come to gloat, but I took no pleasure in seeing her like that. When I was in a wheelchair she showed no pity or empathy so it was as if fate decided to teach her what it feels like to be helpless and stuck inside a body that doesn’t work. I will pay to keep her in the best care possible. I owe that to her father.”

“What about Zackary?”

“He’s confused and frightened, but time will take care of that.”

“Poor thing,” I whispered.

“So you see. I am the only one you need to worry about now. It’s me and you … and nothing else, and no one else. Do you understand?”

I couldn’t help smiling. “Who lives that way?”

“We will,” he said. “You and me and Zackary and all the other children we will have together.”

He came forward and pulled me into his arms, lightly moving his nose from my hair and down my face to my neck, inhaling, reveling.”

“How I missed you,” he said. “I would have come to you sooner but all these other events were in the way.”

I pulled away to stare into his eyes. “You’ve known her since you both were children. She has to be more than an unfortunate event to you.”

“She is,” he responded, and I could see the deep sadness in his gaze that he was as usual trying to hold at bay … to mask. “Especially when I think of her father. She will have the best care and assistance that she needs, but my road together with her ended a long time ago, even before ours began.”

I released a deep breath which made my entire frame quiver.

That made him laugh. “Relax,” he said to me and placed the lightest of kisses on my forehead that made me want more.

“I love you, Charlotte Conrad.”

“Me too. I love you so much I could die.”

“Don’t you dare do that.”

I grinned.

“We’ll take it one day at a time, okay,” he stated.

“I couldn’t ask for more,” I replied, and slid my arms around his neck.

“You’ve been crying,” he noted as his gaze searched mine.

I nodded, comforted by his warmth and strength. The tears and sadness seemed far away.

“Never again,” he ordered.

Nodding obediently, I crushed my lips to his and gave in to the incomparable taste of home.